Ronald S Rubino

The judge in the trial of ex-Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino denied a request Friday to acquit the defendant on charges that he helped to divert nearly $100 million belonging to cities, schools and other agencies that had deposited their funds in the county-run investment pool. The decision by visiting Los Angeles Superior Court Judge J. Stephen Czuleger means that the jury of 11 women and one man probably will determine Rubino's fate at the end of the case. Rubino's defense attorney, Rodney M.

In Orange County's philanthropic scene, Sharon Esterley has a reputation as a formidable event planner. Seemingly tireless, relentlessly detail-oriented, the former John Wayne Airport spokeswoman has marshaled the less driven into action for causes from breast cancer to the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art. But for the past nine months, Esterley, 53, has been devoted to a solitary cause: securing an innocent verdict for former County Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino, her husband of the past decade.

The Orange County district attorney's office put one of its own investigators on the stand Thursday as its final witness in the criminal case against former county Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino. As part of his testimony, investigator Larry Lambert read some of the former budget director's responses to earlier questioning before the Orange County Grand Jury. There will be no testimony today. Prosecutor Jan J.

Ex-Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino told two top aides they were better off not knowing too much about a multimillion-dollar account that began appearing in the Orange County treasury, the aides testified in court Wednesday. The testimony was the strongest that prosecutors have yet elicited against Rubino, who is charged with helping then county Treasurer Robert L. Citron illegally skim $91 million belonging to nearly 200 cities and schools to solve the county's budget problems.

Ex-Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino told two top aides they were better off not knowing too much about a multimillion-dollar account that began appearing in the Orange County treasury, the aides testified in court Wednesday. The testimony was the strongest that prosecutors have yet elicited against Rubino, who is charged with helping then-county Treasurer Robert L. Citron illegally skim $91 million belonging to nearly 200 cities and schools to solve the county's budget problems.

In his first public appearance in more than a year, Orange County's disgraced former treasurer unexpectedly testified Tuesday that he never told then-Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino of his plans to illegally skim into the county treasury millions of dollars belonging to cities and schools. Robert L.

In his first public appearance in more than a year, Orange County's disgraced former treasurer unexpectedly testified Tuesday that he never told former Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino of his plans to illegally divert millions of dollars belonging to cities and schools into the county treasury. Robert L.

For a golden moment Tuesday, Robert L. Citron wowed a room full of novices with tales of financial wizardry. It was almost like old times. Citron, testifying for the prosecution against former Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino, described to a crowded courtroom the absurdly complicated financial mechanisms he used to turn million-dollar gambles into $4-million payoffs. Jurors stopped taking notes. The judge rubbed his chin. "Beyond me," defense attorney Rodney Perlman remarked.

The lead prosecutor in the first criminal trial springing from the Orange County bankruptcy got her start in the working world as a United Airlines stewardess before the job was called "flight attendant." Jan J. Nolan, a 57-year-old grandmother with a blunt, no-nonsense courtroom manner, was raising a family in Lake Forest when she decided to go to law school in the early 1970s. The youngest of her four children had just entered kindergarten at age 5; her oldest was 9.